WWRS: The Forge

July rolls around and it’s time for another edition of The Wyrd Ways Rock Show. One day I’ll get this back onto at least a fortnightly schedule, but sadly that isn’t this month.  You know how time gets away from you as life gets in the way?  This is one of those times. Anyway… loads of new music as usual, including material from the new, forthcoming Masterplan album, the new single by Kai Hansen…

I’m now on Mirtazipine at a 15mg dose. My mood seems to have stabilized. Except for the panic attack I had in the pole studio car park on Tuesday (30th June) that stopped me making it to the class I had booked. I got there about 17:50, pretty much as normal (the traffic had been a bit heavier than normal, since I’d set off a few minutes later) and was listening to the latest edition of In Orbit…

That’s me most of the time, if I’m honest. I usually start things with a plan, and then that plan decides it’s had enough of my brain and leaves. That leaves me having to wing it. Which is precisely what I’m doing now – winging it. I did have an idea for an article, but as it stands right now, I’ve got nothing. So really that’s what this article is going to end up being about: the random stuff…

That was the reaction I got from a colleague when I said to them what my plans were for a Tuesday evening last year. She was more than a little surprised, but was a lot more accepting of it than I expected. One older male colleague was a lot less outwardly surprised. He sagely commented on how much upper body strength someone would have to have to do what I was doing. There were people at work…

…and not in the “amusing” funny way… Not saying this isn’t related, but I came off anti-depressants by accidentally going cold turkey about three weeks ago. I was taking 20mg of escitalopram per day, but thanks to an intersectional cock-up between my ADHD brain, Pharmacy2U and my GP, I ended up being unmedicated for five days. I had a GP appointment for a medication review already scheduled…

Welcome to another edition of The Wyrd Ways Rock Show. Pride Month 2026 is upon us and we have a special shout to previous guests, Porcelain Victoria and Edie Montana for International Sex Worker’s Day, which happened on the 2nd. As with every episode, The Wyrd Ways Rock Show focuses on bringing you the best new music from established bands like Armored Saint, Accept and Black Veil Brides and…

Welcome back to another edition of The Wyrd Ways Rock Show. As you’ve come to expect we’ve got a sprawling playlist that wanders through the best of what’s new and noteworthy. We kick off with the classic Heavy Metal of Generation Steel and Armored Saint, then drift into the more melodic waters of Black Veil Brides and Holy Wars. The voyage (since we seem to have tapped into a nautical theme)…

No interview in this edition of The Wyrd Ways Rock Show, so it’s a real “good news, bad news” situation. The bad news is that you don’t get to hear from a band or a member of the worldwide Rock and Metal community who can give us a perspective that we might not normally have. That’s why I want to interview people on the show, to show that the stereotype of the knuckle-dragging moron is completely…

This is interesting: It didn’t just happen in the US, either. Over here in the UK, suddenly there were no Rock bands on Top Of The Pops, where even The Wildhearts had made several appearances. The Friday Rock Show on Radio 1 was removed and replaced by Pete Tong and his ilk and shoved into Sunday afternoon. It was then moved to midnight on a Tuesday/Wednesday before vanishing. The Rock Shows all…

Found an article on Metal Injection that I totally agree with. Wouldn’t you just know it, though, a lot of the comments disagree. If you want to read it yourself (and you should), HERE’S THE LINK

Welcome to the latest edition of The Wyrd Ways Rock Show. As always, the focus remains on the music and the push to get diverse voices heard. The centrepiece of this show is an interview I did at SOS 2025 with young Manchester-based band, Dacara. Huge thanks to them for the chat. As is the tradition here, I handed them the keys to the playlist for a bit afterward. You’ll be hearing Nice Try and…

This one took a bit longer to put together than expected.  Honestly, I wanted to get it together a couple of weeks ago, but just didn’t have the spoons. Anyway… As usual, The Wyrd Ways Rock Show is about new music and forcing a woke agenda down your throats.  So a lot of the bands have women in them.  With today, as I type this, being International Women’s Day, I think that’s kind of…

Wyrd Ways Rock Show CDXXXVI features special guests Anika McRae (one of the head honchoes of City Of Counterculture) and John Marshall joining me in the studio… erm the room at work we recorded in for this edition. Both of them are more than likely to make repeat appearances. As always, there’s a strong focus on new material and up-and-coming bands, but there’s also some more experienced hands on…

This edition of The Wyrd Ways Rock Show marks a new chapter for the show, with a fresh theme tune replacing Rat Salad. With Black Sabbath’s retirement and the passing of Ozzy Osbourne earlier this year, it felt like the right time to make the change and usher in something new for the show. In this edition, we’re diving into a solid mix of Trad, Symphonic, and Death Metal with a bit of Folk and…

Okay, as you’ve probably noticed this edition of The Wyrd Ways Rock Show is running a little late. For those of you wondering where I’ve been, I’ve been dealing with some vision issues over the past few months. Things were getting pretty bad, to the point where I couldn’t read the screen on my computer properly and had to give up driving at night because I literally couldn’t see the end of the…

So it happened! Anika and Kirk pulled it off. The inaugural City Of Counterculture exhibition happened at the newly refurbished Bradford Arts Centre.  It celebrated the illustrious past with the help of those of us who remember it, and looked forward ro the future. Here’s a tiny snapshot: